Here’s a post from last year; now we’re moving into competition season it’s useful to remember how to ride lines, be it over skinny cross country fences or styles in the working hunter ring. You can even apply the tunnel technique to riding your centre line in your dressage test.
When riding skinny fences, or with a horse who may be a bit green and try to run out over tougher showjumps, I keep my shoulders back, hands off the wither and close together so that I`m tunnelling the horse down my line over the jump.
I took a client cross country schooling a couple of weeks ago and explained this principle to her when I started teaching her aboout skinnies, and riding a line to her fences. Similar to when you`re riding the centre line of a dressage test, you want to be focused on being straight, tunnel the head and shoulders with your reins close together and then use your legs to push the horse down this tunnel.
My rider applied this technique and was soon soaring over the skinnies and through little combinations. Afterwards though, when she was cooling down she asked me why. Previously she had…
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